Apple Seed Apple
By Bill Gillard

The teacher plants herself
Behind the heavy wooden desk
Hands flat, palms down
A great, old tree
She has grown in this place
Steel roots push up gray linoleum
Her body, a trunk, barked and phloemed
Her hair branches with summer leaves
Purple vines curl up her calves.
.....The same old question
From the boy in the back
Where he's always sat:
"If there are 10 seeds in each apple,
How many apples are there in each seed?"